Life and Times of Joshuah Nichols
by schillingklaus
Summary: Melodramatic Novelet. Joshuah Nichols has been downright corrupted by Drake Parker. Is he ever going to win the Nobel Prize for Physics and Chemistry?


** Life and Times of Joshuah Nichols**

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** Klaus Schilling **

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**Rating:** PG-13

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**Disclaimer:** I don't own any of the shows and lyrics used or alluded to.

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**Abstract**

**Genre: **Friends, Family, Science Fiction, Fluff, Spiritual

**Fandoms: **_Drake & Josh_, _Zoey 101_, _Suite Life of Zack and Cody_, _Sonny With A Chance_, _Unfabulous_, _Ned's Declassified SSG_

**People: **Joshuah Nichols, Megan Parker, Drake Parker, Mindy Crenshaw, Craig Ramirez, Eric Blonowitz, Quinn Pensky, Firewire, Doty, Arthur, Cody Martin, Arwen Hawkhauser, Barbara Simka Brownstein, Tapeworm, Zora Lancaster, Mary Ferry, Duane Ogilvy, Simon Nelson Cooke, Evelyn Kwong, Lisa Zemo, Albert Wormenheimer, Bernice Livinghocker, ...

**Summary: **Josh had been completely corrupted by his step-brother Drake. Will he ever win the Nobel Prize for Chemistry?

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**Table of Contents**

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1. Dissociating the Boobs

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1.

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1.

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1.

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1.

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2. Change of Conditions of Kinetics

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2.

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2.

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2.

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2.

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2.

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3. Conservation

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3.

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3.

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3.

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3.

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3.

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3.

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3.

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4. Megan's Catalysis

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4.

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4.

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4.

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4.

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4.

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5. Chaotic Year

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5.

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5.

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5.

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6. Turning around

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6.

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6.

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7. Moving On

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7.

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7.

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7.

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8. The Substitutes

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8.

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8.

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8.

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8.

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9. Ionic and Covalent Bonds

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9.

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9.

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9.

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10. Balancing

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10.

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10.

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11. All Alone

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11.

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11.

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12. Neither A Male Nor A Female Be

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12.

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12.

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13. Restructuring

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13.

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13.

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14. Right Measure

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14.

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15. The Laws Of Life

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15.

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15.

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15.

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15. The End

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** Chapter 1. Dissociating the Boobs**

* * *

As a tweenie, Josh had had the wish to become the greatest chemical scientist of all times.

Alas, things had changed when his father Walter married Audrey Parker, the mother of his step-brother Drake Parker.

Drake was a reckless jerk and womaniser, and Josh tried to compete with him.

While he had been able to maintain his freakiness to some degree, his affinity to Drake made him fall down like nothing. He lost every contest to Mindy Crenshaw who had been his on-and-off girlfriend for quite some time.

The bottom was reached after a dance contest. His partner and Drake's partner had been at each other's throat and thence had to be disqualified, and so Drake and Josh danced together.

The jurors had decided in their favour, but the appellation committee had to disaqualify Drake and Josh for two reasons: First, they had not been registered as partners at the beginning of the dance contest, second, same-gender couples were not allowed in the small print.

* * *

"OK, boobs!" Megan Parker, Drake's little sister, was disappointed. "Can't you get anything done right?"

Drake and Josh shrugged.

"Josh, I can tell you why you will always be a loser ..." she looked sternly. "it's because you hang out wit Drake all the time instead of sticking to your laboratory and your books, as decent nerds too. Ask Craig and Eric!"

Josh stared oddly at Drake.

"You've been so close to being done with Drake, but then you've turned weak. This is going to break your neck!"

Josh sobbed piteously.

"And Drake ..." Megan glared viciously at her brother. "Manly boobs like you should not hang out with softie boys and get their back rubbed!"

Drake looked flabbergasted. "How do you know that ..."

"Don't ask why!" Megan commanded. "I know it, and better nobody else does!"

Drake and Josh trembled with dismay.

"And Josh, maybe you will be interested in this ..."

Megan showed Josh a video.

"What's that?" Josh screamed with dismay. "Drake is paying Mindy?"

Drake tried to destroy the video device, but this would not have restored Josh's confidence.

"Why Drake, why?" Josh sobbed.

"In order to distract you from your mental superiority trip ..." Drake admitted after several minutes of tickle torture by Megan.

"OK, Drake, I'm done with you!" Josh boomed. "And this time for real! Get out of my room, you pathetic fool! You've destroyed my life."

"But Josh, I ..." Drake was consternated.

"Boob, move into my room!" Megan told Drake. "It's gross, but we have to go through this until we find something better ..."

Drake sighed. He got his belongings together, not leaving anything at all ...

Josh sobbed piteously, so Megan had to leave him alone for a bit.

* * *

Drake wasn't pleased at all as Megan had shown the pictures unto Josh.

Megan shook her head. "And so? Making deals with the creature, as you call her ... was that a nice thing of yours?"

Drake sighed with shame.

"I tell you one thing, boob ... " Megan thundered. "You are in Josh's way, as much as Josh is in yours. You don't need each other, you just pervert and corrupt each other, like two pieces of foul vegetables in a chest."

Drake was flabbergasted.

"So, for the better of both of you, you should separate." Megan sighed. "I'll be proud of you when you hit the record sales record. I'll be proud of Josh when he wins his scientific awards. But nothing like that will ever happen as long as you hang out with each other. One day, you will be friends again, after each of you has found his own way."

"Er?" Drake wondered whether Megan's words made sense, but he better accepted it, unless he wanted to eat dogfood in the back of a rusty car, as Megan had prophesised. "ou're probably right." Drake moaned apathetically.

Megan hugged Drake. "Soon it will be alright."

* * *

Josh experimented with some salent liquids.

Megan entered carefully. "Drake has calmed down for the time being."

Josh beamed. "This salent solution is in equilibrium. Dissociation and association happen at the same rate. They are a reversible processes."

"Cool!" Megan didn't care to understand. "Now you may better concentrate on your scientific hobbies instead of trying to be a sloppy copy of Drake! I want to be the step sister of a Nobel Prize winner, not of a dummy."

Josh sighed. "I wish it were that easy. But unfortunately ..."

Megan wondered. "What?"

"They seem to prefer girls ... Mindy always beat me." Josh moaned. "Noone ever cared for my works on plasma chemistry, but Mindy just needs to clone a puppy, and everyone cries for her ..."

Megan scratched her head. "Maybe you're right ... but there is a simple trick to find out ..."

"What trick?" Josh wondered.

"Just give your best, and leave the rest to me!" Megan grinned mischievously. "Leave it all to me! [[1]]"

* * *

** Chapter 2. Change of Conditions of Kinetics**

* * *

Josh wanted to obtain some acknowledgement on the theory and practice of plasma kinetics.

Megan held a sheet in her hand. It was a registration module for an award for young scientists. She took her ball pen. According to Josh, girls were always preferred, and for that reason, she took a photograph of her own and attached it to the registration sheet. She grinned. Alas, she couldn't make the connection to Josh too obvious. Thus she needed to invent a whole new identity. She grinned when she took her cellular phone, starting to dial the number of her friend Jessica in Colorado[[2]]. "Hi Jess, it's Megan from San Diego ... fine. But I need your help for something." Megan explained Josh's situation unto Jessica. "After all, I need a fake address for the communication with the prize committe, and I'd like to use yours, for nobody would connect you with the boob ... OK, thanks, but what name to use?"

Jessiaca told Megan about her deceased cousin Paige Howard who would have been approximately in Megan's age.

"Perfect!" Megan grinned. "Thanks, Jess!" She filled in the blanks. A new scientist was born: Paige Howard[[3]]. Megan filled in the whole rest, using the dates of Paige as far as she could remember. She added Josh's description of his experiments with plasma chemistry. And off to the committee ...

* * *

"You did what?" Drake startled when he heard megan talking about her mischievous plan.

Megan grinned. "This way, the committee can't discriminate Josh for being male."

"But won't they ask you questions? I've heard there's a final colosseum where ..."

"Boob! It's a colloquium ..." Megan shook her head. "Yeah, sure, but ... don't you remember when you tried to impress that beast Michelle?[[4]]"

Drake did remember. "You want to wear a microwave nacho and Josh will hide in the closet and tell you what to answer?" Alas, he also remembered that there had been problems.

Megan nodded. "It's a micro chip, but yeah, that's the plan. If it goes wrong, I'll be disqualified. But I don't want to win, it's for Josh getting the attention he deserves!"

Drake shrugged.

"Now go and practise with your band!" Megan commanded Drake.

* * *

Josh still had terrible remorses.

Megan calmed him down. "You don't have anything to lose, boob!"

Josh shrugged helplessly.

* * *

A few weeks later, Megan convinced everyone at the final colloquium. She was able to present the results of Josh's research just as if they had been her own. She didn't really understand what she was talking about. It had to do with the influence of pressure and temperature on chemical reactions near the plasma point. Yet Josh told her everything over the micro chip.

The Prize Committee couldn't help announcing Paige Howard as the winner.

* * *

Back in San Diego ...

"You've been so right ..." Megan told Josh. "There just needs to be a somewhat cute girl, and those fools go all crazy, over the same results that went unnoticed when you have proferred them."

Josh sighed deeply. At least he knew that his work really meant a considerable scientific milestone. "But how do I get my vindication?"

"I have to come out ..." Megan remarked. "We just have to choose the right point ..."

"When will it be?" Josh twitched.

"Jessica told me that Paige is invited to various demonstrations. Of course we can't go everywhere, so I have to pick." Megan sighed. "There's a prep school near Hollywood, called the Pacific Coast Academy, which isn't too far from here."

Josh smiled. "So your plan is to demonstrate my plasma engine right there, and then come out?" Josh was already excited.

Megan nodded. "And then the hiding game will be over. Phew!"

Drake had heard them talking. "Hey, I know that school ... I've performed there with my band, like two years ago ...[[5]]"

Josh remembered vaguely. "Oh, yeah ... really?"

Drake beamed. "All the hot chicks over there ... they couldn't pay me for my performance, so they've made these shirts for me ..."

Josh chuckled. He went to the homepage of the Pacific Coast Academy. "Hey, that's interesting ... there's a girl who has got a scientific blog, her name is Quinn Pensky!" Josh started studying Quinn's blog and smiled.

"Earth to Josh! Earth to Josh!" Megan and Drake exclaimed unison, yet there was no reply as he was sunk too deep in his thoughts.

"I like Quinn's take on Heisenberg's incertainity principle ..." Josh beamed. He swooned ecstatically.

Megan was a bit annoyed. She had mentioned similar stuff like a few hundred times during the colloquim, without having a clue about what she was talking. Fortunately, the spook was soon going to be done, wasn't it?

"This guy looks great, too!" Josh pointed at another blog with pictures. "His name is Wayne Gilbert. He and his friends Arthur and Doty build robots with rocket launchers." Josh swooned.

Megan and Drake took a look at the pics. They didn't care to read all the stuff, though.

"They waste their time with stuff like Galaxy Wars ... they are more gay than even Craig and Eric ..." Megan remarked.

"Off to the Pacific Coast Academy!" Josh grinned and bounced around.

* * *

** Chapter 3. Conservation**

* * *

Megan told Josh to hide in a shrubbery. She wore the micro chip, allowing Josh to see and hear everything.

Josh was rigged and ready to intervene when anything was going to turn out dangerous.

* * *

Megan was lead around by some Zoey Brooks, a blonde and Ms. Perfect. She was allowed to visit the physics classes of Mr. Beringer.

Megan got to see Quinn Pensky for the first time. She was the valedictorian of that class and knew everything better than Mr. Beringer.

Quinn explained something about geosyncronous satellites.

Josh, who listened carefully, noticed that Quinn must have confused the more general term geosynchronous with the more specific term geostationary, a very popular confusion. He told Megan about Quinn's mistake.

Incompetent Mr. Beringer chuckled and wondered how many false things Quinn had already told them.

Quinn pouted.

Josh had remorses. Just because Quinn didn't know that fine distinction, and many scientists were casual enough to do so, didn't mean that she deserved to become the laughingstock of the class. This reminded him oh-so-much of the situation he used to be in whenever Mindy had picked on his mistakes: It had been oh so humiliating. He ordered Megan to tell them that Quinn wasn't really wrong, hoping to cheer her up.

For Quinn, that didn't make much of a difference. She was really upset and depressed.

* * *

A few minutes later, Megan and Zoey entered Quinn's dorm. She saw something that looked like a failed antigravity chamber. Of course she wouldn't recognise it, but Josh told her his conclusions.

Quinn confirmed Josh's guess. She had built that chamber and tried to test it on the cellular phone of her dormitory pal Lola Martinez. The result was obvious: Instead of making the handheld device float atop of the antigravity chamber, the poor thing got heated and turned into some viscuous goo. The energy that would have been needed in order to undo the gravity field had been falsely indirected into inner kinetic energy of the texture of the cellular phone, heating it up. No energy was thus lost, it had just been tansferred into a form different than expected.

Josh remembered Lola - she had been once at Premiere Theatre, as an actress, She wasn't yet really famous, but, according to Helen, she appeared promising. And she was on Drake's hotness level.

Megan thought the same, and she wanted to ask Lola to give her her number for Drake, but it wouldn't have been fo any avail: Lola's cellular phone was ruined.

Megan promised to fix the anti-gravity chamber, which was not too hard, given that Josh told her how to do so, and he had already done this at home.

Alas, after this successful intervention, Quinn felt even crappier and more humiliated than ever before. Unlike Josh, Megan was younger than Quinn, which scratched Quinn's self-esteem even more. In addition, Megan's hair was more shiny than Quinn. She was now close to giving up on her prospects of a scientific career.

Josh didn't exactly know what he had done to Quinn, but his remorses grew more and more.

* * *

The next day, the real demonstration of Josh's invention, tarnished as that of Paige Howard in whose disguise Megan had come, was going to be performed.

Quinn had got a nightmare of Einstein dancing with Paige aka Megan and calling her the most promising young scientist. This gave Quinn the rest: She decided to stay away from the presentation, and , even worse, to throw all her chemicals and other scientific devices into the trash bin.

This caused an explosion which shook Josh awake who had still been hiding beyond the same shrubbery. Josh was now really depressed and would have liked to jump into the trash bin and get torn into pieces.

* * *

Dean Rivers, the headmaster of the prep school, opened the demonstration. He was proud of this honour. The school was going to run with Paige Power, as Megan called it.

Basically, it was just the energy that is free by some plasma reaction: No energy is lost or gained, just transferred into a different shape.

Megan pulled the lever and made Josh watch the instruments.

Josh was still absent-minded because of all the remorses. But suddenly ... "Hey! There's something wrong ... Megs, please, you need to get the boss to evacuate the campus!"Josh was flabbergasted.

Megan choked and begged Dean Rivers.

The pupils left the campus.

Megan had, of course, no clue how to fix it, and Josh's remorses made him less than competent in such a situation. She needed Quinn's help desperately, but the latter felt too much intimidated and humiliated by the events of the last day, and the dream about Einstein on top of those.

Only Zoey, who,inspite of being a smart girl through and through, wasn't much more skilled in science and technology than Megan, offered to help, but she couldn't do anything better than reading the instruments.

Megan tried to appeal to Quinn's superb intelligence.

Finally, Quinn gave in and came to the rescue.

With Quinn's saving ideas and Josh's instruction, the catastrophe was prevented _in extremis_. It had been really close.

* * *

Josh was still shocked and unable to come out, although Megan had asked him.

Megan understood Josh's mood, and she tried to give him a break. She went to have a smoothie with Zoey and Quinn. There she avoided talking about science. They came to talk about Zoey's little brother Dustin who had been Quinn's test rabbit on and off for a few years. The more Zoey talked about Dustin, the more she caused Megan to swoon, but Megan refrained from showing it. She wasn't going to see him that day - he had been as terrified by the event as most of the pupils. But surely some day ...

* * *

Megan and Josh were happy when they arrived back in San Diego. They had a lot to tell to Drake. But the necessity for coming out had not been removed, just postponed and reshaped ...

* * *

** Chapter 4. Megan's Catalysis**

* * *

"The Caltech ... isn't that your dream?" Megan asked Josh. "Many NASA scientists and Nobel Prize winners of Physics and Chemistry went through Caltech's undergraduate and postgraduate school."

"Cold Egg?" dumbfounded Drake wondered. "What's that? Is it something to drink? How does it taste?"

Megan and Josh glared oddly at Drake.

"The Caltech! It's a renowned university for students of physics, chemistry, and advanced engineering, nothing jerks like you will ever want to be subjected to!" Josh sighed. " Sure it is ... but they won't believe that it was my work ..."

Megan shrugged. "Are you sure boob?" She grinned. "It's all documented!"

Josh was puzzled.

Megan went to her room and fetched a DVD. She came back and inserted the disk into the appropriate device. "OK, boobs ... what do you see?"

Josh was flabbergasted. "These pics ... that's me performing my experiments ..."

Megan grinned sadistically. "So what?"

"Those pictures aren't meant to exist ..." JOsh stammered. "Especially you shouldn't watch me ..."

Megan whistled innocently. "Aw boob!"

Drake shrugged. "Don't you get it? Little sister is watching you!"

Josh banged his head against the wall. "I'm so ... I should have known that."

"Do you want to see my espionage equipment?" Megan asked.

Drake and Josh sighed. They has always suspected that, but they had never been able to prove it unto Audrey and Walter, and they got themselves repeatedly into trouble for shamelessly accusing Megan of doing those things. Alas, as things appeared to be, it was now turning into a boon for Josh.

Josh was still not completely convinced, but he decided to take his chance.

* * *

"Ms. Howard!" The president of the Caltech smiled. "So ... you've decided to join us?"

Megan sighed. "I would if I were Paige ... but, alas, there is no such thing as a Paige Howard."

The big boss looked flabbergasted.

Megan breathed heavily. "Well, there was, but she has died long ago. My name is Megan Parker, and I'm from San Diego, and Paige was the cousin of my friend from Colorado, where the real Paige was from."

The boss choked hard, unable to understand.

Megan had to explain more. "The awarded work we're talking about isn't mine, it is that of my step-brother Joshuah Nichols, and I can prove it. He's waiting outside."

The boss ordered his secretary to send Josh into his office.

Joshuah bounded in and shook the boss's hand.

Megan explained the whole story. She also made it clear that the trick was all her own idea, Josh couldn't get blamed for the deceit.

The old guy was still consternated. "But why did you pull off that stunt?"

Megan told him about the discrimination against males in the scientific award contest.

The president first did not want to believe it, but Josh and Megan presented the appropriate documents: The rejection of his work when he had honestly submitted it as a male, and the wholehearted acceptance of the same work when submitted by Megan.

The chief deemed that scandalous. He decided to call an expert on Josh's field of research into his office for an interview.

Josh and Megan kept waiting, twiddling thumbs.

Finally, the expert bounded in.

Josh and the other guy started talking about plasma reactions. The centre of the conversation dealt with the catalyst Josh had used for his plasma reactor.

Two hours later, Josh was accepted.

* * *

Back in San Diego Belleview ...

Drake hugged Josh upon command.

"Thanks, brother!" Josh smiled. "I'm now off for Pasadena. It's a pity that Quinn declined for the time being ..."

Megan shrugged. "She'll join just a bit later ... I'm going to arrange that!" She whistled innocently. "This way, I may also get an autograph from Lola Martinez for Drake ..."

"Lola?" Drake's eyes bugged out. His mouth turned all wet. "That's the hottest of all the female future Hollywood stars!"

Megan chuckled.

"Good old Megan ... still the same as ever before! You've been a great catalyst for my career and more!" Josh chuckled.

Megan and Drake did not really understand what Josh meant, they really didn't want to, either.

Josh got his belongings together, rigged and ready for Pasadena.

* * *

Mindy Crenshaw went pale. She had always been superior to Josh, but now he had beaten her to the Caltech. She needed to get there as well, sooner or later. And, once there, so she swore solemnly by the blood of her parents, she was going to make Josh's life as miserable as only possible, worse than ten years of hell!

* * *

Craig Ramirz and Eric Blonowitz sighed with despair. They had been rejected by Pasadena. Although they were on the honours role and had taken over ten AP classes and had obtained full SAT score, they were not deemed suitable for a decent college as they were completely unsociable dorks and geeks who still kept on talking about kinky tweenie stuff, and they made dry jokes that scared the responsible clerks to hell and back. Hence they just had to prove that they did not need any college as they were way too smart to profit from any stupid education. It was all or nothing, and Josh Nichols, so they swore, was going to be the first to be forced to bow to their superior genius.

* * *

** Chapter 5. Chaotic Year**

* * *

It was now time for Joshuah's freshman year at Pasadena. His majors were chemistry and physics. He was disappointed because Quinn Pensky had chosen to stay at high school instead of coming to Pasadena right away.

The classes were usually boring, barring those in applied metal engineering where they had a new teacher, Arwin Hawkhauser, who had previously served as a hotel engineer at the renowned Tipton in Boston, Massachusetts.

* * *

Arwen used to talk a lot about his experiences at Tipton's. "I've always repaired everything ... almost everything! But this didn't prevent the plumbing from exploding over and over again!"

Josh chuckled brutally.

"The entropy of melting metals is a very interesting and complex subject ..." Today, Arwen instructed his students in soldering and welding wires. "And, I can't stress it often enough: Wear your protective glasses!"

The students laughed.

Arwen explained the entropy of the soldering process. "Not that I understand it ... I just know: The bigger the entropy, the more fun!" He shrugged helplessly.

Josh, of course, had a lot more detailed theoretical understanding of entropy. Alas, it didn't help him when it was his turn welding a few pieces of metal. He twitched like an eel, sending the sparks flying across the workshop. "Cool!"

Arwin and the other students felt urged to duck out of the way. Josh was a living source of entropy, but so was Arwen.

* * *

At the weekends, Josh liked to return home to San Diego Belview, seeing Drake and Megan again. And, of course, he could not resist demonstrating the skills in welding and soldering that he had acquired during the last weeks in Arwin Hawkhauser's classes. He talked about entropy.

Drake shrugged helplessly. "Entropy ... That is something to eat, isn't it? How does it taste?"

Josh twitched nervously.

Megan chuckled when she watched Josh welding his night lamp.

Drake still hadn't understood what Josh's tools were useful for. He took the welding device. "I guess it's a hot plectrum!" He beamed. "Let me see what we get when I use it in order to play my guitar!"

Josh had to concentrate on his preparations for the next demonstration, hence he did not realise what Drake was about doing.

Rake pushed a button. "Hot music, yeah!" He drove the welding flame across the strings of his guitar.

"Drake!" megan was flabbergasted. "What are you doing?"

The strings on Drake's guitar started heating up insanely, and, finally, melting.

Megan couldn't help racing to the socket andpulling the plug, hoping to be able to save her brother from further mishaps.

A last spark flew right into Drake's face, singing his nose.

Drake screamed with agony. what had he done to his guitar strings? He touched them and burnt his fingers badly.

Megan shook her head. "Boob! Ypu need to wear protective spectacles and protective gloves when you do so!"

Finally, Josh awoke from his deep concentration. He fetched his first-aid kit and applied a few bandages and patches to Drake's face and hands. "Fortunately I've been the best in my first-aid class for laboratory accidents!" Josh boasted. Alas, he twitched too much when he applied the bandages, whence tormenting Drake even a bit more.

"The flame is hotter than myself!" Drake complained when he was finally all bandaged and ointed.

Megan nodded. "Oh boob! I've been welding things in your room when I was at elemenbtary school, and you still don't get it!"

"You've been doing what?" Josh twitched and squealed with dismay.

Drake was consternated, too.

Megan tried whistling innocently, but she had to realise immediately that it was all in vain, as she had just admitted to it. "You remember when you've been in hospital,and your climatic regulation was all messed up when you came back?"

Josh scratched his head.

Megan grinned. She added a long list.

Josh sighed with agony. It wasn't really surprising for him that Megan had done all those things. So he wasn't mad at Megan because she had done them, but he was mad at himself because he hadn't figured all this earlier.

"OK, boob, now watch and learn!"Megan donned the protective gear and took the tools. "Now I'm going to repair mom's coffee machine!"

Drake and Josh tried to watch carefully.

"And thence the description of the machine mentions roasted coffee beans?" Drake supposed foolishly.

Josh twitched.

Megan told the boobs to stay quiet! She couldn't concentrate when Drake and Josh continued wreaking havoc.

Too bad, the boobs never listened. They caused Megan to slip a few times without really noticing it.

Suddenly, they heard steps. Apparently, mom was back from the shopping mall.

Drake, Josh, and Megan decided unison to hide under the table.

Audrey entered through the door. "Cool! I could really bear a cup of fresh coffee!" Audrey beamed. She opened teh coffee box and filled some poweder into the machine. Then she added water and plugged the machine into the socket. She whistled merrily while waiting for the coffee.

Suddenly, a strange stench came forth from the machine.

Audrey shrugged cluelessly.

Without warning, a ray of hot, brown water squirted forth from the belly of the engine, staining Audrey's totally new blouse and burning her chest. She screamed and whimpered painfully and was totally dismayed. "Drake? Josh? Megan? Walter?" She yelled at the top of her lungs, but there was no reply. She fle into the garden.

The kids sighed with relief.

"I've never known that two boobs and one girl may cause that much entropy!" Megan concluded.

* * *

** Chapter 6. Turning around**

* * *

The first year was almost over, and Josh had been feeling very lonely at his new school.

Now Megan had to keep her promise and talk Quinn Pensky into joining Caltech. Hence Megan accompanied Josh to the PCA.

Quinn was astonished to see Megan again. She had heard about the deceit.

"OK, Quinn ..." Megan sighed. "This is the real genius at the bottom of Paige Howard ... my step-brother Josh."

Josh twitched when he shook Quinn's hand.

"He is feeling lonely at Caltech, and you should come there , too!" megan stated in a dry manner.

Quinn sighed. "Now that I've found a fiancé here, Logan Reese ..."

"The billionary heir?" Josh twitched again.

"I bet he isn't as smart as Josh!" Megan boomed.

Quinn nodded. "He's dumb and dumber in one person ... but he's got the money, and his grandpa was a teacher at Caltech. I'd inherit his library with some rare titles."

Josh nodded. "He has written a book about advanced molecular chemistry! I love the chapter about enantiomers."

"The one you've tortured us with when you were a student teacher at my elementary school?" Megan looked venomously at Josh.

Josh sobbed. "That one, sure! And I'd do a lot in order to get at rare numbers of Chemistry Today from the sixties."

Megan choked. "Quinn, so you just pretend to like that worthless dumbess, so you may ..."

Quinn nodded solemnly.

"These are just somne old articles." Megan moaned. "Together, the two of you could revolutionise the history of chemistry. Forget about Jerkan Reese!"

Quinn and Josh looked like dumb sheep.

"Josh, do you still like me if you know that I like hula dancing?" Quinn sighed.

"I could tell you a lot of stupid habits of Josh's!" Megan whistled innocently.

Josh shook Megan and twitched. "You don't dare to do that!"

Quinn chuckled. "Do you want to see my right foot? It has got six toes!"

"Josh does many crazy dances!" Megan glared at Josh.

"Could you show me some?" Quinn cheered.

Josh didn't really want to, but he got poked by Megan, making him feel compelled to.

Quinn applauded. "OK, I'm going to dance with you! But don't step on my sixth toe!"

Josh and Quinn danced the night away. When Josh turned to the left, Quinn turned to the right, just as two corresponding enantiomers make the polarisation vector of light turn in opposite manners.

Megan smiled when she saw Josh and Quinn have a lot of fun.

"OK ..." Quinn beamed. "I'm going to join you to Caltech!"

Josh smiled.

Then Quinn turned to the ignoble masses. "I hate you, Logan Reese! You may keep your stupid money!"

Megan met Zoey Brooks. "Hi Zoey, have you seen that?"

Zoey nodded. "Quinn and Logan ... that has been so downright disgusting. Logan is the worst jerk of California, if not the whole nation. I'm happy that she has changed her mind in time. Oh, Dustin is in his lounge ..."Zoey grinned. She knew that Megan held special feelings for her little brother.

And, actually, Megan ran towards Dustin's lounge at the speed of light.

Josh and Quinn danced around while discussing advance molecular chemistry and their latest inventions.

* * *

Josh and Megan came home to San Diego Belleview.

"Josh and Quinn seem to get along pretty well." Megan grinned.

Josh swooned.

"Oh, I see ..." Drake admitted.

"By the way, Dustin gave me something for you ..." Megan grinned mischievously. "Lola's phone numbers, and pics of Lola in her new hot outfit ..."

Drake's eyes bugged out. "Give it to me! Now!"

Josh took a good book about advanced molecular chemistry and read the chapter about enantiomers, annoying Drake and Megan to death. But he knew that the next year at the Caltech was going to rock like nobody's business.

Drake, in turn, fetched his cellular phone and called Lola Martinez. After ten minutes, he summarised: "Lola wants me to accompany her to the next Première Party!" He bounced around and cheered insanely.

Josh didn't care. The encounter with Quinn made him still swoon, forcing him to swing and gyrate both left and right, like light hitting a mixture of enantiomers.

* * *

** Chapter 7. Moving On**

* * *

As the valedictorian of his year, Josh was assigned to advise a group of freshmen, among them Quinn Pensky. He cheered.

Quinn hugged Josh. High School had been totally boring for Quinn: All those dumb pupils who couldn't understand the difference between potential and kinetic energy.

Three other pupils from the Pacific Coast Academy followed Quinn to Caltech. Those were Wayne Gilbert, generally better known as Firewire, and his two friends Doty and Arthur. They were easily to recognise by their diabolic grin.

Quinn was upset because Firewire was in her tutor group, as he had been very hostile for quite some time. He had opposed to girls joining the science club at her school.

Josh shrugged. "But this was just a trasitional phase. As we all know, Firewire won't do this anymore."

Quinn sighed.

Firewire chuckled sadistiacally.

Alas, the tutor group was not yet complete. There was still one student missing.

The door went open, and in came no other than ...

"Mindy!" Josh was flabbergasted.

Firewire shrieked. "What's that? A creature?"

Josh coughed. Why did a geek like Firewire use such an expression which hitherto had been applied to Mindy Crenshaw only by jerk Drake Parker?

"I'm a girl!" Mindy grinned. "Something you male geeks wish to not have in a science club." She grinned satanically. "But who builts the bigger photon cannons which are able to perforate steel concrete blocks?"

Firewire and his pals chuckled.

Quinn explained that her favourite photon cannons were based on four-level laser technology, which involved the exploit of an additional transition state which allowed for emit a lasting laser beam.

Mindy nodded solemnly. "Josh didn't want to believe me, and his photon cannon could only drill through wooden boards! I see that he has learnt a lot ever since!"

Josh trembled with dismay. It seems as if his less than glorious past which he had already wished to leave behind had just returned.

"You can't be a girl!" Firewire snickered. "You have to be some alien creature!"

"The apocalypse!" Doty remarked. "The end is near! Dystopia!"

Arthur poke Doty. "The Dystopia is not the end! It is just a transitional state from on the way from the world as we know it and the time of rapture!"

Josh was confused.

"Aw, I am a girl!" Mindy insisted. "And I may even prove it!"

"Not here!" Josh groaned.

Firewire and Mindy had finally calmed down.

* * *

Josh had gathered his group once again. "Today, we are talking about transition states in chemical reactions. I've prepared a few experiments with chemicals as we have them in our households."

"Pulverised plutonium?" Quinn squealed with excitement.

Josh shook his head. "Detergents, cosmetics ..."

Quinn pouted.

Alas, Josh loved it that Quinn had always kept a few rare chemicals under her hood.

Firewire grinned insanely, over and over again.

"Many chemical reaction require some activation energy." Josh explained. "It is needed to get reacting molecules close to each other, as the valence electrons of each molecule repel each other before they experience the attraction from each other's nucleus. Once the activation energy is provided, the proper miracle of chemistry may start: Molecular bonds, as hitherto beknownst, begin to reform. This is a transition state. In an irreversible reaction, this is a point of no return."

The students listened with excitement.

Josh finally distributed the chemicals. "With laser spectroscopy, it is possible to come very close to observing transitional states."

Quinn smiled. "I love spectroscopy!"

Firewire chuckled ecstatically.

Josh shrugged. Alas, there was one thing that made him wonder. "Where is Mindy Crenshaw?"

The students shrugged helplessly, as none of them had seen her since the bgin of the week.

All of a sudden, Mindy stumbled in.

"Where have you been?" Josh moaned. "You're half an hour late!"

Mindy choked. Fortunately it was a voluntary tutor group and not a class where they could get punished for not having a perfect presence record. "Oops!"

Josh shrugged. "So, where have you been?"

"Er ..." Mindy coughed. "You remember my conversation with Wayne Gilbert, just a few weeks ago?" She boomed. "The one where he refused to call me a girl, but called me a creature instead?"

"I do ..." Josh moaned.

"Well ..." Mindy contunued. "This has activated something between me and Firewire. I just had to show him that I'm a girl ... and ... this left me in a transition state that lasts maybe nine months ..."

Josh choked. "What do you mean?"

Mindy fumbled with her hand bag and produced a test stripe. She helf it aloft, exposing a pink cross.

Firewire still didn't understand. He looked aghast at Doty and Arthur.

"It means that Mindy is pregnant!" Doty told Firewire.

"You're going to be a dad!" Arthur chuckled insanely.

Firewire went pale. He had gone too far and could not rewind anymore. He coughed and stepped up to MIndy. "Ms. Creature ... do you want me to marry you?"

Mindy sighed. "OK, Firewire!" She sighed with relief. She knew that he wasn't going to be a good dad, nor was she going to be a good mom. But at least they sucked together. She threw her arms around Firewire, never wanting to let him go.

* * *

It was going to be an exciting time for Josh and all the other members of his tutor group, too. They had come very far after all the efforts they had shown in order to make it to this elitarian college for scientist, yet they knew that college time was nothing but a transition state.

* * *

** Chapter 8. The Substitutes**

* * *

Josh's Sophomore year had been a lot of fun. Alas, he hoped that his Junior year was going to be even more fun.

He had been the most popular tutor of the last year, hence many freshmen wanted to choose him as their tutor, substituting those of the last year, especially Mindy who was on a baby break.

Those new pupils included Duane Ogilvy, Mary Ferry, Simon Nelson Cooke, Albert Wormenheimer, Lisa Zemo, Bernice Livinghocker, and Evelyn Quong.

* * *

Josh entered his tutoring group. "Today, we will learn about substuents in molecular chemistry!"

Simon Nelson Cooke grinned. "I've substituted most of my vitals with micro technology. That is true progress!"

Josh twitched. How was that possible? "Are you a cyborg? Kindf of? Sort of?"

Cookie nodded proudly. "Of course! I'm the greatest cyborg of all!"

Josh twitched again. He was slightly scared by this Simon guy. But he ws certainly brilliant, as were all of the Caltech freshmen.

Evelyn Quong didn't exactly share his opinion. "He's just a dork!" She thundered.

Josh shrugged. Today, he had prepared an experiment. The student had to mix various ingredients. During the chemical process, several hydrogen atoms were going to be substitued by halogens. "OK, this substitution is reasonable because both hydrogen and the halogens lack one electron in their outer shell in order to become satisfied. This provides for single molecular bonds. In other cases, we need double bonds, making one substituent replace several hydrogenic atoms at one time."

Evelyn Quong grinned. "So, whom is Cookie going to replace? Quinn Pensky?" Like most of the other students, she was well aware of the fact that Quinn had been Josh's favourite disciple during the last year.

Josh twitched. He really didn't like making comparisons. He never wanted to make his feelings for Quinn a reason for preferring her in the laboratory over his other students. But many students had started badmouthing him. Josh had had a totally hard time struggling against those rumours and fits of slanter.

* * *

Josh huggled Quinn and licked her on the forehead. His daily work was done, and now he had gone visiting her in the attic she was living in. They didn't want to make everything worse by looking for a common apartment to live in. He sighed deeply and explained unto Quinn what had happened.

Quinn snickered. "What a cool comparison! Alas, substitution amy be a pretty complex process ..."

Josh nodded. "Before I moved in with Drake, he had done many things together with Megan. But after moving in, Drake and I started hanging out together. Megan hated that, and she tortured us to no end. But hanging out with Drake was no good for me. Thus Megan did the best and split us asunder."

Quinn chuckled. "Cool! She must have been very obnoxious ..."

Josh nodded and told Quinn endlessly about Megan's vicious pranks.

"But she really did a lot for you ..." Quinnr emarked. "Like the whole fake Paige thing ..."

Josh sighed. "It's only when I finally substituted you for Drake that everything started turning out for the better ..."

Quinn smiled happily. "The same happened when you substitued that jerk of Logan Reese ..."

Josh kissed Quinn on the cheeks, making her swoon.

"Was it much of a problem when Drake's mom subsituted for yours?" Quinn wondered.

"In the beginning, it was ..." Josh sighed. "But things improved with the progress of time. I got accomodated to the change." Josh twitched. "Alas, nowadays, Walter and Audrey are falling apart, again, like unstable bonds."

Quinn couldn't help chuckling crazily. "Who is the new substituent?"

"A certain Coco Wexler ..."Josh shrugged as he did't know her.

Alas, Quinn did. "Coco?" Quinn fell through the roof laughing. "Oh my dear!"

"You do know her?" Josh was consternated. He twitched again.

Quinn laughed. "Know her?" She coughed while still being overwhelmed by her own laughter. "She was my dorm adviser at the PCA! A poor excuse of a dorm adviser!"

Josh twitched. "Oh, really? Tell me?"

Quinn nodded. "Once she ordered a bra online. It was the evening she had to assign the dorms for a new year at the PCA. But, when entering the data, she substituted my dorm number with her cup size. I was assigned room 84D ... which didn't exist!"

Josh fell backwards laughing. "So ... where did you stay?"

"I was reassigned to dorm 101. I had to substitute for Zoey's former best friend, Nicole Bristow."

Josh fell insinde out laughing.

"We've been friends already before that, but they are a poor excuse of friends. They made me turn more and more stupid and decadent the longer I've stayed with Lola and Zoey." Quinn sighed. "They got me into wanting to get mouth kissed by Dork del Figgalo, and, when he wasn'rt a good kisser, by Jerkan Reese, instead of concentrating on my career as a scientific researcher." She sighed piteously. "Fortunately I've got rid of them before it was too late. Anyone here at Caltech is a better substituent!"

Josh chuckled.

* * *

Finally, Josh had got his group under control. Nobody felt anymore to be a poor substituent for someone else. They were all great scientists. They could easily take over for each other when it was needed, but that didn't make them substitutes.

* * *

** Chapter 9. Ionic and Covalent Bonds**

* * *

Finally, Josh arrived at the Caltech for his senior year.

His tutor group had grown too much during the last two years, it was the biggest among all the groups that the Caltech had ever seen. This underscored Josh's extreme brilliance and popularity among the slightly younger students. This year, he was only assigned three new students.

Arwen Hawkhauser, the teacher for practical engineering who had instructed the students in their freshman years, had lured three new students from his hometown Boston, all across the country.

Those freshmen were Cody Martin, Barbara Simka Brownstein, and some Tapeworm whose proper name renamed unbeknownst to anyone, especially to Josh.

On the other hand, Mindy and Firewire had now started their own tutor group where they had to take turns in order to bee able to care for their baby.

* * *

"Today, we are going to study redox reactions ... " Josh announced in front of all the pupils. "In a redox reaction, the so-called redox number of the reagents are subject to a change. Many think that this is equivalent to one reagent losing an electron, while the other is going to gain it."Josh coughed. "But this is an oversimplification you may read in your highschool books. But here we need to say good-bye to that myth. While it appears superficially true when we study simple ionic bonding, such as the chlorides salts of metals ..."

The students chuckled.

"I remember some of my ignorant high-school mates who was so dumb, he thought that scientific errors about hydrogen atoms were funny ..." Quinn remarked, chuckling noisily.

"What an idiot!" Cody exclaimed. "Only my foolish twin brother Zack could be worse!"

Josh sighed. "You don't know my step-brother Drake!"

"Should I?" Cody croaked.

"You would wish that you didn't know him, trust me!" Josh replied.

"Not knowing Zack would be quite advantageous as well!" Barbara Simka Brownstein exploded. She had come to deprecate Zack as much as Mindy hated Drake.

"Ionic bonds are idiotic!" Cody remarked. "It is like as if I borrowed something unto Zack who will never give it back to me, just in order to make us mutually dependent." he sighed deeply.

"I know that feeling ..." Josh moaned with disgust. "It was like that between Drake and me for like four years, until Drake's little sister Megan tore us apart, for the better of both of us ..."

Cookie nodded. "I remember the insane relationship between my so-called friends Jenifer Mosely and Ned Bigby ..."

Josh sighed. "We could talk about that subject on and on, but ionic bonds are not the only possible bondings in chemistry. Now we need to move onward to covalent bonding which is characterised by sharing of electrons. Even here, it is possible for redox numbers to change." He sighed. "For example, in a Chlorine-Fluorine reaction, the redox number of Fluorine goes from zero to minus one, whereas that of the Chlorine goes from zero to plus one."

"Valence bonding would be between me and Josh!" Quinn remarked astutely.

"Sure, sweetheart!" Josh chuckled and swooned.

The other students applauded fanatically.

Thereupon, Josh told the students to perform all of the various experiments around redox reactions that he had just prepared.

Cookie was the most industrious of the students in Josh's tutoring group. He performed experiment after experiment at an incredible speed while recording the results in his usuall detailed and acribic manner.

* * *

Josh's tutor groups had been a plain success over three hole years. Alas, time had come to graduate from Caltech.

Drake and Megan were about preparing a graduation party. The ionic bonding between Drake and Megan had become very strong during the last years, although it was as insane as in the case of Zack and Cody.

More than that, they planned for Josh's future after Caltech. They wanted him to return to San Diego Belview and become a freelance inventor. He should share again a room with Drake, until he was going to marry Quinn, as this was the best for both of them: The problems between Drake and Josh that had caused them to stray from their determined paths were all gone by now, and both Drake and Josh were established in their field as a scientist and a rock star, respectively.

As of yet, Josh didn't know anything about Drake's and Megan's plans for him.

* * *

** Chapter 10. Balancing**

* * *

Drake Parker had gathered his band, consisting of lead singer Lisa Perkins, drummer Neil[[6]], co-drummer Gary[[7]], and many others, in the yard in front of Drake's and Josh's room. The band had harvested multitudes of awards and platinum records since Josh had resigned from management. ,

Passionate oboist Megan had gathered a little orchestra of her own, with brilliant mucisians like flautist Michael Barret, beatboxing flautist Greg Pattillo, violinist Zora Lancaster, pianist Nevel Papperman, and many others. Much to Josh's surprise, she had even talked Quinn Pensky to participate, playing her trombone, while Sophia Simka Brownstein played her violin. This way, they balanced the rock music of Drake and his band.

Josh was flabbergasted when he returned from Caltech and saw all the people in front of his house. He walked ahead and huggled Quinn insensate when he saw her.

Quinn smiled. "And Megan really didn't tell you that I'm here?"

Josh nodded. "That's too true. Megan is truly the Queen of Surprises."

Quinn chuckled. "Do you know what happened when I was on my way from Pasadena to San Diego?"

Josh shrugged with ignorance. "You tell me?"

Quinn grinned. "I sure will, sweetie! Well, I've counted the cars driving fron the LA area to San Diego County, and those running vice versa."

"Oh, cool!" Josh liked statistics. "So, what was your conclusion?"

Quinn croaked. "There were as many cars bound fro San Diego as there were for the LA area!" She grinned. "Well, not quite as many. There were two more cars bound fro San Diego than for LA, but I may have miscounted in some situations ... "

Josh admired Quinn's acribicy, just as usual. "Oh cool! But ... do you know what this reminds me of?"

Quinn nodded silently.

"Chemical reactions!" bellowed Quinn and Josh unison.

Megan's ears hurt. "Can you believe it, Drake?"

Drake sighed. "No, what's it?"

"Quinn and Josh ..." stammered Megan. " They have one day off school and all the science stuff, and they can't help but talk about chemistry!"

Drake shrugged and moaned.

Josh grinned. "A chemical reaction is in an equilibrium when it proceeds at the same rate as the counter reaction," explained he unto Drake and megan who were flabbergasted. "My BS Thesis was about the determination of equilibrium in various reactions. And I made quite a few interesting observations."

Quinn nodded. "They were very interesting. And we only blew up half of the laboratory!"

Mindy, who was among the guests, carried her little toddler around. "Oh, hi! Typical Josh ... blows up the laboratory!"

"Oh, he's sweet!" remarked Megan about Mindy's infant.

"It's a girl!" Mindy grinned mischievously when she corrected Megan. "Oh, and I've found some mistake in Josh's thesis ..."

"I challenge you to explain the mistake! Right here!" bellowed Quinn.

"Oh, I will!" Mindy heard that her kid hasd just started crying.

"Drake and I, we will take care of the howler!" offered Megan unto Mindy.

Nodding solemnly, Mindy rendered the infant unto Drake.

"A mini-creature!" Drake remarked solemnly.

Mindy glared at Drake before she started explaining Josh's mistakes.

* * *

"Who would have thought that such an awkward creature could have such a cute baby!" Drake started playing with the beast.

Megan grinned. "Will Lola and you have babies, too?"

"We are more into kissing than into having babies!" replied Drake.

"I know!" Megan grinned.

"Would it be an equilibrium if I kissed Lola as much as she kisses me?" Drake asked.

Megan grumbled. "Do we have to ..." She sighed. "On the other hand, it is fun."

Drake nodded solemnly.

They started unwrapping, cleaning, feeding, and rewrapping the crying fury.

"If a baby shits as much as it eats ..." Megan pondered.

Drake chuckled. "Caught you!"

Megan grinned. "Cool, boob!" Then she took her oboe and played a lullaby for the infant.

For a few minutes, the kid remained in a balanced state between being awake and sleeping, before it passed out.

Drake and Megan high-fived and chuckled.

Megan looked around. They had been restructuring Drake's and Jish's room for several weeks. It had not been easy. The mortar crumbled and dissolved from the walls as fast as Drake and Megan had tried to patch it. It had been a painful task, but now it looked nice. "Finally, Josh and you may live together, giving as much unto each other as taking from each other."

Drake chuckled. "Oh yeah, that's wonderful!"

Megan and Drake had to render the infant unto her rightful mother. But they had learnt a lot about equilibria in that process.

* * *

** Chapter 11. All Alone**

* * *

Josh's first year after college was assumed to be boring. All of his best friends were still at Pasadena, while he was sitting there in Belleview, sharing a room with archdumbster Drake. He also knew that Megan wasn't very far away, and always rigged and ready to pull one prank or another, although he knew that she was a loving and caring little step-sister who had done a lot in order to get his career started.

Josh had established a little laboratory in his and Drake's shared room. They had agreed on a strict separation of Drake's and Josh's belongings. Obviously, Drake was afraid of Josh's acids ecercising some adversary impact on Drake's guitar string, making them rust like nobody's business. Megan had used some piece of chalk in order to render the demarcation line visible to anyone.

Megan wondered when she found Josh experimenting with bubbly liquids. "Poisons or explosives?" She grinned in anticipation, as she was never out of reasons for making some good usage of either of these.

Josh, of course, knew about Megan's obsession with dangerous substances, they were always great for pulling a prank on some obnoxious people. He whistled innocently. "Is it any of your business?"

Megan eyed Josh sternly.

Drake who lay on his bed in his half of the room yawned. "Come on bro', I want to know it, too!"

Josh sighed. "OK! but I've warned you ... it is an experiment about isolated systems!"

Drake and Megan looked ignorantly at each other. "What?" They shrugged helplessly because they did not understand what Josh was talking about.

Josh sighed. Why did he have to explain everything unto those ignorant Parker kids? He shook his head. "OK, for you dumbsters ..." He twitched. "An isolated system is something that sdoes not exchange anything with its environment, no matter, no energy, no entropy ..."

Megan and Drake gazed at the demarcation line.

"OK, so, if we don't cross the line, you are isolated?" He wasn't sure whether he had understood anything, but he tried to sound smart.

Megan hugged Drake. "That's how I see it, too!" She smiled.

Drake shrugged. "I couldn't live in isolation. At least I need Megan to torture me every now and then!"

Megan tickled Drake mercilessly, making him squeal like a tweenie lass.

Josh shook his head ... "OK, all that, and, even worse, no information!"

Megan took this as a more or less subtle hint telling them to shut up. Hey, the bighead couldn't be subtle. He wouldn't have recognised subtlety if it had hit him like a meteorite. She poked Drake.

Drake nodded. He grabbed Megan's wrists. "OK, let's meet Dustin and Lola over at the cinema!"

"Cool!" Megan smiled. She knew that there was always a lot of ado going on at helen's motion picture theatre. Nothing in there was ever isolated, and this made the hole thing funny. Isolated systems, so she fancied, were totally boring, and she didn't have the slightest clue why someone like Josh was interested in them. Not even Josh could be such a bore!

Josh sighed. He would have loved to stay more in contact with his friends from Pasadena, but they were all busy, and so was he with his many experiments over here. But, on the other hand, being undisturbed was going to turn out as a great boon. And he smiled about Drake's and Megan's ignorance. Isolated systems were by no means boring. Even if, barring the universe as a whole, they were not strictly real, they were still approximately real under many circumstances. And they were responsible for the discovery and advancement of many theories that were also valid for more open, realistic systems. Josh studied isolated systems in plasma physics. He was on the brink to a new discovery. But, for the time being, this breaking news only existed in his isolated head, unbeknownst to those who could understand him, such as Quinn, Firewire, Mindy, Cookie, Cody, barbara , and so on, and ununderstandable to those who dwelled near him, especially Drake and Megan. But time would come when thge whole world was looking up to his brilliant discoveries which he would not have made unless undisturbed by his surroundings.

* * *

Drake and Lola made out in the cafeteria of Premiere Theatre, while Dustin and Megan were studying the list of movies.

"Hey sweetie! Have you already seen the last movie in the left column?" megan poked Dustin.

"One hundred years of solitude?" Dustin shrugged. "I only know that it's by some winner of Nobel's Prize for Literature. "

Megan nodded. "I so hope that Josh makes a Nobel's Prize, too!" She swooned.

Dustin nodded. "With Quinn's help? No problem!" He smiled.

Lola chuckled and blushed. "I'm in that movie ..."

Drake was astonished. Lola had actually been able to keep this a secret.

"Sometimes it's easier to work on things just by yourself." Lola moaned. "Sharing afterwards is a lot more fun!"

Drake, Megan, and Dustin agreed wholeheartedly. The gang bought tickets and went to see the movie.

* * *

** Chapter 12. Neither A Male Nor A Female Be**

* * *

While Josh had taken up his life as a freelance inventor, and his friends from his tutor group were still at college, his worst rival was working on his own with dangerous substances.

This rival was nobody but Craig Ramirez, a former friend of Drake and Josh. Craig had been excluded from college because he was not sociable enough. Hence he studied on his own, and he was way more efficient than Josh, Quinn, Mindy, Firewire, Cookie, Cody, barbara, and on and on and on it goes. Besides thinkering with chemistry, Craig also liked to read poems. His favourite was William Shakespeare.

Today, Craig was sunk in an experiment about acids and bases. He was about discovering a new theory about the pondus hydrogenii, a measure for a substance whether it be a strong or weak acid or base.

Bubbles of gas shot aloft when Craig poured some drops of acid into a bowl into which he had dissolved some punce of powdered sodium bicarbonate

Craig startled from the noise. He paniced and hit the book shelf.

Upon impact, a book, which was going to turn out as a volume from the collected works of Shakespeare, slipped and dropped off the shelf. It landed with a thud, right on the nose of consternated Craig Ramirez.

Craig moaned with dismay. He took the book off his face. He noticed that it had opened itself. Hence he decided to took a look at the page that had been exposed literally in front of his nose, or maybe even on top of the same. Craig took some handkerchief and wiped a fat stain, caused by his nose, off the paper. Then he read it:

* * *

Neither a borrower nor a lender be;  
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,  
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.  
This above all: to thine own self be true,  
And it must follow, as the night the day,  
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

* * *

-William Shakespeare : _Hamlet_

* * *

Craig smiled triumphantly. What he was about reading, it was so wonderful. He remembered that Eric, his former best friend, had never returned any of the things Craig had been borrowed unto him. There was one simple reason for that: Whenever horny spaz Eric Blonowitz saw a busty blond, he totally forgot about Craig. He sighed. The reason why Craig had started to learn much more efficiently than Eric was because Craig was not interested in male and female crap. It made Eric's intelligence, usually towering above humanity, sink into the mud and swamp of decadence and corruption.

Coming to think of it, wasn't a neutralisation reaction, such as the ones that he had just been studying, essentially donation and acceptance of protons? That's sort of like borrowing and lending. Hey, the whole disgusting stuff that is going on between males and females may be reduced to this simple formula: Borrowing and lending. Shakespeare must have seen it coming.

Craig concluded that the best for a person was to be neither male or female, or, as Shakespeare had expressed it, to be neither a borrower nor a lender, or, as he had observed from chemical reactions, neither an acid nor a base. This saved him from perverse distractions to which Eric had permanently fallen prey, and which, or so hoped Craig, was going to bring downfall to Joshuah Nichols and to his mistress Quindolyn Pensky. Craig smiled in anticipation of his triumph over Josh. Yeah, Josh should have learnt from Shakespeare. He knew probably most of his works by heart, but had never learnt anything. So many things had he borrowed unto Drake that got never returned.

Craig smiled sarcastically. Good old Shakespeare!

* * *

Whenever Megan watched Drake and Josh, she couldn't help thinking about mutual neutralisation of the two boobs. So often had Josh lectured her from his books about advanced chemistry, mentioning neutralisation. And it made all perfect sense to Megan, even if she wasn't really interested in chemistry.

* * *

** Chapter 13. Restructuring**

* * *

The year after, Quinn Pensky moved in with Josh.

As Walter Nichols got finally divorced from Audrey for whose taste he was way too messy and poorly organised, as opposed to the taste of his new fiancé, Coco Wexler, there was enough space left in the residence of the Parkers for Quinn to move in. Alas, it was necessary to rearrange the rooms in the house in order to take appropriately account of the new situation.

Quinn was already forward to moving in with her beloved bighead. "Hi snugglebear, do you know what I'm working on, for the time being?"

Josh scratched his head. "You're going to tell me?"

Quinn nodded solemnly. "I've found a new trick to determine the most stable among a variety of structural isomers." She beamed brightly.

"Cool, sweetie!" Josh was proud of his fiancé. "May I help?"

Quinn pouted. "No, you have to help, my cuddle bear!" She foldhled Josh's head all over, grinning schemishly.

Josh twitched rhythmically. "Yeah baby!" He bounced around like a little child.

* * *

Quinn had just finished writing an article for the _Chemistry Channel_. She printed it on three-hole paper and put it into a folder with a transparent cover.

Along came Drake and Megan.

Drake rubbed his fat fingers against the cover.

"Eeew," complained Megan. She took a napkin in order to clean the cover.

Drake shrugged.

"Isomers ..." megan scratched her head. "Stange word ..."

Drake chuckled. "Josh and Quinn just love to use strange words that we don't understand. They want to torture us this way."

Megan grinned. "Too true!" She hugged Drake.

"Why don't we zaplook it on the interweb?" suggested Drake. "Then we may pretend that we know something."

Megan grinned. "OK!" She looked it up. "It has to do with different ways to arrange the same set of atoms in molecules, or so."

Drake scratched his head. "Why would anyone want to think about it? It's usually hard enough to find one way to get things done."

Megan nodded.

Finally, they had removed the fat stain from Quinn's folder.

"Hey! Wouldn't it be funny if we rearranged the sheets in Quinn's folder?" suggested Drake.

Megan nodded solemnly. "Of course!" She opened the folder and started fumbling with the pages. She swapped pages, tilted the sheets upside down and landscape, and she reversed the front- and backside of the various sheets.

Drake smiled.

Thereupon, Drake and Megan hid under Josh's bed, and they watched what was going to happen.

Quinn returned to her room, and she smiled when she watched at her long article. It was probably the best article in the history of articles about isomers. But what was that? Quinn screamed when she noticed the chaotic state of her folder. She sighed when she had to rearrange the pages in a correct manner. She grumbled noisily.

Along came Josh. He held several test tubes, filled with gross, bubbly liquids, in his hands. "Hi, candy bear! Look what I've dione! I've tested your method for determining the most stable among various structural isomers."

Quinn smiled. Then she told Josh about the disorder she had encountered in her folder.

Josh groaned. "I could swear that Drake and Megan are behind it!"

Megan and Drake had a hard time suppressing their insane laughter, in order to avoid being discovered too easily by the chemistry freaks.

Quinn shrugged. "OK, I've rearranged them in the correct manner. It took me half an hour, though." She sighed. "But now, let me take a closer look at your experiments!" She smiled.

Josh grinned with glee. "Here they are. The one in the middle is the most stable of all, I think ..." He twitched.

Quinn hugged Josh tightly.

Josh twitched again. Alas, this time, he wasn't able to hold on tight enough to his test tubes.

The containers dropped to the ground, and, without warning ...

Bang!

Various itemms flew across the room.

Megan and Drake screamed in panic, reveiling themselves.

Josh and Quinn glared at the obnoxious intruders.

Megan shrugged. "What? We've learned a lot about isomers."

Drake nodded solemnly. "The explosion must have changed the arrangement of the items in your room as thoroughly as can be."

"Just as the contents of your folder!" megan grinned diabolically.

Quinn and Josh sighed deeply. "Too true!"

But in no way did this diminish the value of their scientific work.

* * *

** Chapter 14. Right Measure**

* * *

In the following years, more and more of Josh's friends from Caltech graduated.

Drake and Megan had suggested Josh to build sort of a club with them. Together they would easily reach out for a Nobel Prize, according to Megan.

According to Drake, Josh deserved a less noble award for permanently pestering him with explosions, nuclear accidents, poisonous smells, and other obnoxious events that were caused by chemical experiments.

And like Drake, Megan had a hard time understanding the necessity of those experiments. They often woke up in the middle of the night - it has to be said that the sleep of the members of the Parker family was rather light, compared to the one of Josh and his relatives - and had to see Josh doing strange calculations, mumbling softly stuff about the proportions of various elements.

Josh shrugged when he saw his dumbfounded housemates. "The same reagents may react in differing manners. Which of various reactions is most likely to happen, it depends, among many other things, on the concentration of the reagents."

Megan and Drake glared at each other. What the heck was Josh talking about?

Josh chuckled silently about Drake's and Megan's ignorance. He called Quinn in order to help him.

Quinn was now Josh's lawfully wedded wife. Josh was addicted to laws as they brought a means of stability into his life. He needed to be able to measure and sort everything in order, and only the laws of chemistry helped him doing so. And his relationship with Quinn had always been a finely-tuned chemical reaction that followed strict rules.

Drake and Lola were pure fluff made in heaven, but they did not like to succumb to laws. They lived their livesspontaneously, and marriage was too much of a hassle to burden yourself with.

Megan and Dustin were severely addicted to each other, but they relied wholly on their intuition instead of any firm rules.

Quinn stepped through Josh's careful analysis, both forth and back and in circles, but she didn't find the right measure for the reagents in order to lead prevalently to the one reaction they had in mind.

Drake and Megan pondered.

"So, basically, Josh says that things may turn out differently when you change the initial quantities, like two boobs and one cool girl leading to a different result than one boob and two cool girls," guessed Megan.

Drake scratched his head. "Probably, yeah. If Josh didn't have me, but two mischievous devils of little step-sisters ..." He tried hard to imagine that situation.

"Chaos!" Megan chuckled.

Drake agreed wholeheartedly.

They went through a variety of related what-if games, such as what would have happened if there had been more freaks like Craig and Eric at his school instead of dumb jerks like Drake and Trevor.

Josh and Quinn didn't have any doubts. Unless they had met the right mixture of pupils at their schools, they wouldn't have taken the paths that they actually did tid take. And with the right team of fellow scientists, such as Simon Nelson Cooke, Wayne Gilbert aka Firewire, Mindy Crenshaw, Cody Martin, and Barbara Simka Brownstein, they were going to make more and more interesting discoveries in stoichiometry and related fields of chemistry, maybe even interesting enough in order to win the Nobel Prize.

* * *

** Chapter 15. The Laws Of Life**

* * *

Once upon a time, Megan Parker had to seperate Drake and Josh in order to prevent them from corrupting each other. She had wanted them to become something she could be proud of: A rockstar of world renoun and an awarded scientist.

One dozen of years after her brilliant intervention, half of the family's dreams had come true: Drake had just receibved his first International Award for his records breaking the sales records in over 150 countries, in about any country that provided reliable sales statistics.

When Drake, Josh, and Megan celebrated Drake's triumph, which they did by means of a pyjama party in globally renowned Santa Hotel Chambrolay in Monica, they were looking forward to achieving the second pillar:

Josh Nichols and his team, consisting of Quinn, Cookie, Lisa, Mindy, Cody, Barbara, and Firewire, had been suggested for Nobel's Prize for thier work on a revolutionary reformulation of the Laws of Thermodynamics.

While thermodynamics is properly a branch of physics, it is properly the one branch with most imminent consequences for cheemistry, as well. This overarching relevance of thermodynamics made it plausible why Josh and his colleagues were suggested for both the prize for chemistry and the prize for physics.

Alas, their competitors had been very strong, too: Craig Ramirez, Eric Blonowitz - they had finally decided to work together - and overly ambitious Zora Lancaster, who, inspite of being properly a concert musician like Megan, had gone out of her way in order to compete with the colosses of science.

* * *

Waiting for the decision of the committee was murderous.

Josh stepped mentally through the speech he was expected to give, just in case that he was going to be voted.

Drake and Megan had urged him to talk in a way that they could understand, too.

Quinn was leaning tenderly against him. She was glad that, whether winning or not, they were about going through this together.

Drake, Lola, Megan, and Dustin were among the audience when the umpires stepped up to the microphone.

The scientists nominated for the award sat silently in a corner. They were totally overpowered by the suspense.

The speaker started talking. He talked about the life and times of Alfred Nobel, the initiator of the prestiogeous award.

Megan and Drake thought that their step-brother was totally worthy of his footsteps, no, he was much greater. Rightly spoken, when 150 years would have gone by, scientists should go and reach out for the Josh-Nichols Prize for outstanding scientists!

Finally, the umpire spoke up: And the winner is: ...

The scientists gazed anxiously.

"Joshuah Nichols and his research team!"

The scientists couldn't react all that fast.

But Drake and Megan were immediately astir, and they grabbed Dustin and Lola, not reveiling a trace of hestiation, in order to storm the stage, pounce upon Josh and Quinn with some hitherto unbeknownst glee, and and huggle them enthusiastically to the ground.

The security guards had to intervene withe severity.

Finally, the greatest fans had calmed down, and, thereupon, returned swiftly to their seats.

Craig and Eric had still not understood what was going on. They looked totally dumbfounded.

Zora, on the other hand, was bitterly disappointed. She started weeping.

Josh had been called to give his speech, but he pitied Zora too much, whence he, accompanied by Quinn, walked up to Zora and took her into their midst. "Sir, ten minutes please," he begged the committee.

Zora sobbed at Josh's broad shoulders, and at Quinn's skillfully braided hair, like a little sister that was afraid of thunder roars and flashes of lightning.

Josh sighed. "OK, Zora, we know that you are a raw diamond, you still need to get your polish. It's like a chemical process that has not yet reached thermodynamical equilibrium, and hence it is not possible to assign a unique temperature or pressure or stuff like that. And this means that you can't be properly appreciated, althougheveryone knows that you must be really great. We have gone through this as well. I'm sure you're going to make it to the top in just a few years from now."

Quinn nodded solemnly. "As Josh said it."

Zora started calming down, minute after minute.

Josh and Quinn were yet without children, but they knew that, once they had a daughter, it would have to be exactly like Zora.

The president of the committee begged Josh once again to give his speech.

Josh sighed when he stepped up to the microphone.

Drake and Megan listened solemnly.

"Dear ...listerners and listenerettes ..." Josh wiped the hot, billowing sweat from his face. He twitched like a standed fish. "I thank you for listening for someone as insignificant as me." Josh sighed. "We feel honoured to receive, from the hands of the umpires, this prestigeous award. Chemistry has always been my life. It was not just a life for and with chemistry, but, even more, a life ruled by the laws of chemistry, prominently the thermodynamic laws and there consequences. But, I even think that everyone's life is governed by the same laws of nature. I've come to this conclusion by watching my beloved step-siblings, Drake Parker and Megan Parker, suspiciously."

Drake and Megan looked quizzically at each other. Then they stood up and waved at Josh.

The umpires urged Josh to hurry up.

Josh named the most important laws of thermodynamics, and he explained how he had observed them by studying Drake's and Megan's behaviour on a daily base. "The dynamics of my step-siblings is totally fascinating. They bicker with intense heat, but, at other times, they may work together with the very same intensity."

Drake and Megan grinned diabolically.

Josh sighed. "This underlines the conservation of energy, as the total some of work and heat."

The umpires looked dumbfounded. Nobody had ever seen things like that.

"Also, when they are at odd terms with each other instead of in equilibrium, the world around them is turned into irreversible chaos," added Josh, "akin to the second law of thermodynamics."

Josh mentioned a few more convincing examples. "Thus, in conlusion, my award is totally dedicated to Drake and Megan. Thanks for daring to listen to me."

* * *

Finally, the ceremony was over.

Josh had twitched on and off, and his constantly downpouring sweat had almost flooded the stage.

Josh, Quinn, Drake, Megan, Lola, and Dustin walked back to their hotel, another outpost of famous Chambrolay's, in order to celebrate the victory with a whirlpool party.

The guard of the hotel had just flung out Craig and Eric - who, by the way, had just come to understand that they had failed to win the prize - for being improperly dressed.

Drake, Josh, and Megan laughed about that incident while they relaxed in the excitingly bubbly waters of the pool.

And if they haven't yet drowned in the whirlpool, they are still celebrating the laws of life which are the laws of chemistry.

* * *

** The End**

* * *

[[1] ]song by Miranda Cosgrove which I don't own

* * *

[[2] ]that's where Megan was bound for in _Drake and Josh go Hollywood_

* * *

[[3] ]Miranda Cosgrove's guest role in _Zoey 101_ : _Paige at PCA_ - she's said to be from Colorado

* * *

[[4] ]cf. _Smart Girl_

* * *

[[5] ]cf. _Zoey 101_ : _Spring Fling_

* * *

[[6] ]cf. _Megan's New Teacher_

* * *

[[7] ]cf. _The Storm_,


End file.
